Make a Wish
by dimpleforyourthoughts
Summary: Jessica and Dean share a birthday, and over the years Sam never once says anything to Dean. Spoilers for all seasons.


**Author's Note: Birthday fic for both Dean Winchester and Jessica Moore. Anything you see in brackets [] is supposed to be crossed out, but fanfiction doesn't have strike-through as a font. Spoilers for all currently aired seasons. Please read and review!**

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They spend [Jessica's 22nd] Dean's 27th birthday going to see the world's biggest ball of twine. They cover three states in less than a day to get there, Dean whooping with excitement and Sam grimacing as he navigates.

The ball of twine is underwhelming at best, but Dean buys a disposable camera and takes a crap load of pictures that will never get developed, and they actually go out to a restaurant, where Dean orders a 64 ounce steak, grinning at Sam like Christmas has come early.

The birthday ends with them watching the Searchers together, and Dean falls asleep during the end credits, much like an overtired puppy, spread eagled and drooling on to the hotel mattress.

Sam goes out that night and gets absolutely shit faced at a bar, comes in the next morning on zero sleep, three coffees and the itchy burn of a new case at his fingertips.

Dean gratefully takes the coffee, doesn't even notice the bags under Sam's eyes.

—

After spending the previous year drunk, Sam switches things up for [Jessica's 23rd] Dean's 28th birthday. They're off the case at the Pierpont Inn, and Dean's like a dog chewing at stitches for some fun.

The sneak in through the backdoor of the movie theater and stay from opening until closing, stealing empty popcorn bags out of trashcans and getting refills and sneaking in from movie to movie to movie and it's like taking a kid to the zoo for the very first time, Dean unable to decide between the latest slasher flick or the latest war epic. They see them all, and Dean's complaining of a head ache when they leave but he's smiling and there's a bounce in his step that makes Sam laugh.

Sam spends every single movie with his hand fisted in his pocket, nails all but breaking skin as he tries to focus on the crashes and bangs on the screen and drown out the screaming going on inside his head.

Dean lets Sam drive them back to the hotel, doesn't even notice how Sam runs three red lights in a row and nearly misses five collisions.

—

[Jessica's 24th] Dean's 29th birthday is spent in a paintball arena, because Dean's never been and Dean wants to spend his last birthday trying something new. They're covered in paint and they're laughing and whenever Dean gets somber Sam says something funny, does something stupid, makes a lewd observation that has Dean cracking a grin and it's like breaking the surface of water and gulping air every single time.

In all the desperation to make sure Dean has a last happy birthday, Sam doesn't once think of Jess.

When he realizes this the next morning, he forces Dean to pull over so he can cast up the contents of his stomach on the side of the road, retching choking on guilt and breakfast and missing her.

Dean guesses its food poisoning, turns the music on and keeps driving while Sam curls up against the passenger door and pretends to sleep.

—

On [Jessica's 25th] Dean's 30th birthday they're out of money and go to a strip club and get drunk, Sam a little more so than Dean. There's one blonde stripper who has taken a special interest in Sam, all long limbs and honey yellow locks. Sam orders three more rounds of shots on the spot.

Dean carries him to the impala, and he chalks up Sam's weepy drunk tears to just that: being drunk.

They don't talk about it the next morning. Dean just assumes Sam doesn't remember.

—

[Jessica's 26th] Dean's 31st birthday gets a little glum, because they've just gotten out of the loony bin on a hunt and they've got Lucifer breathing down their necks and it's hard to relax. So Dean says to Sam he just wants to park the car and sit.

So they do.

Sam's awfully quiet, telling Dean the hospital did a number on him, so Dean shuts up about it and instead starts telling corny horror stories like he used to when Sam was a kid.

Sam's smiling by the end of the night, and if it's a bit faked, well, at least Dean believes it.

—

[Jessica's 27th] Dean's 32nd birthday is spent alone. He doesn't talk to Lisa, he doesn't talk to Ben. He drives out to Lawrence Kansas and sits in the empty field and frigid air and wonders if this is what it feels like to die an old man.

It's on this day that Lucifer tells Sam that his brother misses him, that Jessica misses him, that if Sam had just let bygones be bygones and let Dean die and let Jess stay unavenged he wouldn't be here, trapped beneath earth and heat and mind wrenching pain.

Lucifer whispers into his ear, "This is the best present you could ever give them Sam, letting them alone, removing yourself from their lives. They're so happy that you're gone Sam. And I'm so happy that you're here."

Sam believes it, and burns.

Dean sits, and yearns.

—

Sam spends [Jessica's 28th] Dean's 33rd birthday unconscious after Death gives him his soul back. Dean spends the day watching Sam, not moving but to take another swig of whiskey and grit his teeth against the sharp flare in his throat.

When Sam wakes up he thinks he remembers a dream he had, a dream of a familiar smile and lime green eyes and honey blond hair.

He can't remember if that smile, that face, was peppered with freckles or dotted with a single mole.

Something tells him it doesn't matter anyway.

—

[Jessica's 29th] Dean's 34th birthday they go to Disneyland. It's the first time in a while that Sam has thought of Jess, because the event—especially today—is inevitable and Sam just wants to for once not feel like drinking himself into the gutter over today. Wants to go on the teacups with his big brother and bask in Dean's laughter and insistence that they get autographs from Pluto and Goofy. Wants to go through this day and not feel like he's drowning.

He makes it through the night alive.

And he gets wasted the night after, guilt driving him to the bar even faster than the Impala itself.

—

There is no Dean's 35th birthday and there is no Jessica's 30th birthday. Sam is alone. Amelia is at the clinic for the night.

Sam goes out and drives, and this time he skips every damn stop sign and surpasses every damn speed limit and he wonders at the irony of things; how the world just won't let him die, no matter how hard he tries and how much he wants to.

He presses the old scar in his hand, but it doesn't feel real, this world doesn't feel real. There's no flesh and blood brother to anchor him here.

—

It's not until [Jessica's 31st] Dean's 36th birthday that Dean finally cracks.

"Okay, what is _up_ with you?" Dean snaps, nearly wrenching the steering wheel in his irritation as he drives pell mell on the highway. "Everything was good, everything was fine, we were LARPING for chrissakes, and now you're back to moody?"

Sam looks over at Dean, opens his mouth but Dean plows on with "Look, I know you need time but jesus Sam. I can't—I need you to talk to me, man! It's my birthday! So what the fuck is crawled up your ass _again_?"

Sam continues to look at him, calm, eyes slanted.

"You do this every year, and first I thought it was just because you were pouting about it not being _your_ birthday, but this is getting out of hand!" Dean grouses. "It's my birthday! And I want to have fun with my brother on _my_ birthday!"

Sam just looks at him. Dean all but gives up.

But then:

"It's Jessica's birthday too." Sam says quietly, softly, before turning back to the window, yet the words drop and destroy like a grenade.

Dean sits with his foot pressed to the gas pedal and his eyes locked on the passenger seat, lost for words.

—

He waits until Sam falls asleep in earnest before making the U turn. It takes only a few hours to get to California, a few hours after that to get to Santa Monica.

Sam wakes up, it's dark, and he can hear something that sounds like the ocean. Something that is the ocean.

Dean's sitting on the hood of the car, one leg propped up and holding a beer out for Sam, like he was expecting him.

Dean says nothing, but Sam knows what's going on. Sam recognizes this beach, recognizes this pier, this array of twinkling stars that mix with the dim city lights beneath them in a muggy and hypnotizing haze. Sam feels the sand underneath his shoes and knows exactly where he is.

But how did Dean—

"When you were in hell I went through your things and found a receipt." Dean speaks, and Sam almost falls with those words. "Dated back ten years, crumpled, from a restaurant on that pier. Dinner for two."

Images rise unbidden behind Sam's eyes, Jess smiling and Jess blushing and Jess pushing her meatballs over to Sam's plate and laughing at Sam's horrible French as he reads through the wine list. Their first date; fumbled and excited and so damn saccharine Sam can taste it on his tongue, a mix of salt water taffy they bought from a vendor and Jess' vanilla perfume and her watermelon chapstick when she first kissed him, a spark in her eye that drew him in and chased his heart until he was marked, hit and gone for her.

"Why—" the sentence catches in Sam's throat, because his eyes are prickling and he isn't sure whether to be alarmed that Dean went through his stuff or sad that he even had to.

"You never said anything," Dean replies, taking a gulp of beer and picking at his jeans, looking uneasy, "And yeah, maybe it is my birthday, Sam. But Jess…." He stops, chooses his words, like he knows Sam is seconds from disintegrating into the sand, into the earth, breaking and fraying and never reforming again.

"She mattered. I'm not gonna be the dumb ass that refuses to acknowledge that."

Sam stares. Sam wavers. Sam blinks and sighs and looks at his brother, who's sipping a beer and looking like he just told Sam what time of day it was and it was nothing.

"C'mon—," Dean holds out the beer again, a peace offering, a promise, "It's not gonna drink itself."

Sam takes it, sits on the hood next to his brother, and then says something because he _has_to say something, "I wanted to you _enjoy_ your birthdays. I didn't want to spoil them."

"Yeah well," Dean sighs, rubs a hand through his hair, "I hate to tell you this, but birthdays have never been my favorite days. Mine or yours. Our good days are the best days, Sammy." He pauses, catches himself, mulls over the words and Sam grips his beer. "The days where we don't have to worry about things, where we can drive and eat food and listen to music and not worry about all this supernatural crap out to get our asses. _Those _days are my birthdays, Sammy. _Those _are the special days. Because it's you and me, driving down crazy street and doing whatever we want. And to be frank, that's sort of the best gift I can think of, Busty Asian Beauties aside."

There's a word or phrase to cover what Sam wants to say, but Dean's gone and stolen words from his mouth like candy from a broken piñata and there's nothing Sam can say to express the gratitude stretching, bubbling, filling up his chest cavity.

"To Jess," Dean tips his bottle to Sam's, grinning and tipping his head to the side and _It's okay Sammy._

Sam holds out his bottle, breathes the words out and for the first time in ten years he's smiling on January 24th in earnest. "To Jess."

Their bottles clink together, the droplets of condensation blinking against the moonlight and stars like the flickering of birthday candles.

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